Homemade food was one of my favourite gifts after the baby was born. We had little energy to do much other than take care of the baby, and having a freezer filled with meals we could easily extract was reassuring and comforting. Read the rest of this entry »

We finally branched out from our standard veggie burger and grilled vegetable routine.

A delicious routine but still a new routine.

Except, I still grilled some vegetables. They were on a skewer, though.. which makes it somewhat different, right? In this case, they were smothered in a jerk-inspired (but not too spicy) spice rub. I also slathered it on top of some extra-firm tofu.

I used sweet red peppers and a sweet plantain which contrasted with the spice rub incredibly well along with some zucchini, because zucchini grills so very well. In fact, I dare say the plantain was the highlight of the meal. I picked a very black plantain and figured I had nothing to lose, as I wasn’t sure how it would grill, but it was wonderfully sweet and smoky. The only problem? I cut the pieces a bit too small and they were more fragile than the other vegetables. I think Rob lost a few while grilling. I suspect fresh pineapple would be a fabulous substitute for the plantain.

I served this to guests and they raved about it. I hope you like it, too.

Woosh! Can you see the steam? One perk of the black background, although it also picks up the dust, too! HA!

Hope you are keeping yourself warm during this recent freeze. It was -30C/-22F overnight with wind chill. It is times like this that you can remind yourself: only a few short months until our wedding/honeymoon in the Caribbean. And then you remind yourself: WHAT ELSE DO I NEED TO DO???? Thankfully my Mom keeps reminding me of all things I don’t know: making the veil, finding something borrowed, etc. While Rob and I take care of the very hard decisions: garifuna dancers vs firedancer (we chose both!!) and where to go for photos (beach vs jungle… vs where are cliffs.. we want cliffs).

In any case, here is another bowl of a warm, vibrant soup/stew. Jamaican jerk inspired with allspice and thyme (and also cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg) with colourful red bell peppers, yellow plantains and chickpeas with a sprinkle of green onions swimming in a fragrant coconut broth. This is not a hot and spicy soup (like most things jerk), so add as much heat as you like.

We have been all over the coconut rice lately. With mango season comes Mango Sticky Rice. Twice, so far, within the past few weeks. Rob’s latest batch was shared with a friend who proclaimed it the best ever. She had been pining over Mango Sticky Rice since her childhood and was always disappointed with resto versions. Not ours. It quenched her thirst. We split our case of mangos (20/$5!) and she subsequently made her own. Rob’s latest version substituted agave for the sugar and he used the last of our full-fat coconut milk.

While Mango Sticky Rice is good for dessert (or breakfast, in my mind), it probably would not do dinner justice. Try this coconut-infused Jamaican rice and pea dish instead.

Rice and peas is a classic side dish from Jamaica. “Peas” may be a bit misleading because it refers to a type of pigeon pea, which is similar to cowpeas that includes Southern favourites such as purple hull peas, lady cream peas, black eyed peas and crowder peas. If you are lucky enough to snag fresh peas, you will figure out that they in fact, do taste like peas. Kidney beans are often substituted in this dish, as well.

In any case, with whichever bean you choose, I do encourage you to try this dish. It is a very simple one-pot dish wherein everything cooks together and the nuances of the allspice, thyme, lime and ginger really bring out a fun flavour profile. Use full-fat coconut milk for a decadent creamy base, but the reduced fat was great too (which is what is pictured here).

Have you tried coconut rice? I am thinking that adding black beans to our Mango Sticky Rice might be a marvelous dinner, no? Who’s in to try it? 🙂

It is no secret that Rob and I may choose our next vacation destination based on its cuisine. Obviously, Iceland wasn’t picked based on its cuisine, although the food I had was top-notch (although not Icelandic).

One country that is creeping up in our list of places to visit is Jamaica. I don’t know how widespread the Rastafari movement is, but with its mostly-vegan cuisine (called ital), vegan options free of chemical and artificial additives should be available throughout Jamaica. According to wikipedia, they prefer more natural vegetables and fruits such as coconut and mango. Rob would be in heaven.

There are Rasta communities around the world, including Toronto where I’ve been to One Love, which serves ital and other Caribbean vegan meals. However, my introduction to Rastafarian cuisine was in Japan of all places. Around the time I was heading to Japan, Heidigushed over Tokyo’s only ital noodle shop. Sure enough, a lover of food but not even vegetarian at the time, we scoped out this teeny tiny restaurant completely off the tourist track. We enjoyed our noodles and other veggie dishes. While this was Heidi’s best meal of her trip, I will admit that my fresh sashimi was unbeatable at the Tsukiji Market. If I were vegan at the time, I would have really appreciated the vegan soba noodles. In Japan, fresh soba noodles are richer because they are typically made with Japanese fish broth, dashi.

Now that I am vegan, I was stoked to try Rasta Pasta that I found in Big Vegan. A bowl full of vegetables (green beans! mushrooms! collards!, tomato!), with some noodles, too, in a coconut-curry-tomato sauce. It had a lot of the similar ingredients as my favourite Kelp Noodles, Baby Bok Choy, Broccoli and Red Pepper with a Coconut-Peanut Sauce but it was so different. The recipe called for 1 tbsp of curry powder. I’ve made other Caribbean dishes that were unpalatable by their heat (ok for Rob, just not me), so I went tame. I didn’t even use curry powder. I substituted 1 tsp of garam masala instead.

It was a quick noodle stir-fry. With the garam masala, it was savoury. It lacked the sweetness from coconut-peanut sauce, and originally I thought it was rather pungent but truthfully, as I ate the leftovers, that was exactly why I liked it. Nothing too crazy and creamy, just a savoury veggie and noodle dish. However, now that the Madras curry powder has been given the green light in my kitchen, I’d love to try this again with curry powder. If you try it, let me know how you like it!

I used to make my own garam masala until I discovered Arvinda’s garam masala, which is what Rob had in his kitchen. It tastes really good so we’ve stuck with it until our stash runs out.

Just as I have been averse to dishes named curry, I have been avoiding dishes calling for “curry powder”. I will typically substitutegaram masala.

But this time was different. I forged ahead and tried some higher quality Madras curry powder. I knew that even if I hated it, there was a good chance Rob would adore this – a coconut curry is definitely up his alley! Of course, I wouldn’t be sharing the recipe here if I didn’t love it as well. 😉

While there is definitely an Indian influence to this curry, this is a Jamaican curry that I spotted in Big Vegan. Lime-marinaded tofu chunks, sweet potatoes and carrots are combined with collards in a coconut-curry sauce spiced with thyme. Caribbean dishes can be quite spicy, but I still used 1 tbsp of curry powder. The coconut milk helps to tame the heat. However, I omitted the Serrano pepper in lieu of my favoured Aleppo chili flakes.

Even though this wasn’t from Terry’s new cookbook we’re testing, we’ve started to rate all our meals as “love”, “really like”, “like”, “just ok”, “not good” as per our cookbook testing guidelines. As Rob put it: On the love-like scale, I give this a love. I gave it a really like, and let Rob polish off the rest of the leftovers. There are bigger battles to win! 😉

Saveur is busy focusing on other stuff this week, so I’ve stepped into help her out. I’m in the privileged position to be the frequent benefactor of some of her cooking exploits, so it’s only fair that I step in to give her a hand.

Don’t be alarmed! It would be inaccurate to say that I haven’t already had some input here in the past. I’ve helped make some of the dishes on here and done the photos for a couple of them, too.

I’ve written a guest post, too. I introduced tempeh to Saveur a few months ago when we made the CAT food sandwiches together prior to a picnic. I had extra tempeh left over and wondered what I could do with it. Saveur suggested the Jamaican Jerk Tempeh Wraps she saw on fresh365. These looked PERFECT! We would make them together. It would be a team effort.

The Jamaican Jerk Tempeh Wraps required some Worcestershire sauce. Neither of us had any, so I dutifully picked some up at the supermarket. It’s a wonderful sauce that I’d like to try with more recipes. It has tamarind in it, which I’ve decided is always the secret in making pad thai taste better. After making this recipe, though, I lent my Worcestershire sauce to Saveur and eagerly await the day when it can come back.

These wraps really are delicious. They’re not too spicy, but are full of many other bold flavours. Citrus, sour, sweet, and warm; they’re all there. The allspice and nutmeg provides the flavours associated with Jamaican jerk cooking. I would be a jerk if I said any terrible things about these wraps.

I do need to give one warning about these wraps, though. They’re better fresh than they are as leftovers. The tempeh will absorb any extra juices like a sponge and make them a bit dry the next day. Why would you have leftovers, though? They’re so tasty that you want to eat them up right away!